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Questions
- How Long Does it Take to Toilet Train a Puppy?
- What do You Need for Puppy Toilet Training?
- How Useful are Puppy Pads in Toilet Training?
- The Puppy Toilet Training Process
- How to Tell if a Dog Needs the Toilet
- The Best Puppy Toilet Training Tips
- What to do if Your Dog Has an Accident in the House
- The Most Common Mistakes with Puppy Toilet Training
A Guide to Puppy Toilet Training
Does anything beat the feeling of finally bringing your new puppy home? You’ve spent weeks, or maybe even longer, dreaming of this day. Now, that adorable fluff ball is all yours and you can snuggle, play with, and get to know them at last. Until, of course, they have their first accident in the house.
We’re sorry to break it to you, but pups don’t come toilet trained - even some older dogs have never been taught not to go in the house! But for new puppy owners, accidents are inevitable.
As joyous as the first night with your new pup is, you’ll still have to get up with them for toilet breaks throughout - and even then, you run the risk of accidents. Unsurprisingly, you’ll probably end that first night tearing your hair out and wondering how on earth you get started on puppy toilet training and just how long it’ll take.
The good news is that these tough days don’t last and eventually, your adult dog will become a much-loved member of the family who definitely doesn’t leave their mark all over the living room carpet. Whilst it won’t happen overnight; we can provide you with all the tools you need to ensure that you soon know how to toilet train a puppy in the shortest time possible.
How Long Does it Take to Toilet Train a Puppy?
Just like human children, all puppies are different, meaning that every toilet training journey will vary. As much as we’d love to give you a blueprint as to when your pup will understand the concept of going to the toilet, we simply can’t. That said, when a consistent toilet training regime is followed, the vast majority of dog owners find that puppy toilet training takes anywhere between four and six months.
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Although some breeds are easier to train than others, the speed at which you reach that goal depends on a range of factors - most of which are actually down to you, meaning that the timescale is almost entirely within your control. To speed up the process you’ll need to:
Get started as soon as possible
Know the training techniques and how to use them
Stock up on the right equipment
Know what to do when there is an accident
Know how to praise your pup for getting it right
So, without further ado, here are the best tips and tricks that’ll have your pup toilet trained in no time.
What do You Need for Puppy Toilet Training?
When it comes to puppy toilet training, you need to ensure that you have everything to hand to get it right. If you use tools sometimes and not others, you’ll send mixed signals, which could confuse your little pup and slow down the entire process.
Instead, you need to be consistent – starting with the equipment you use. Some of the key products that you certainly can’t do without include:
A crate
Cleaning equipment
How Useful are Puppy Pads in Toilet Training?
You may be wondering just how useful puppy pads like the Pet Living Puppy Pads are for your toilet training. After all, you could try to train your puppy to pee outside straight away - cut out the middleman, right?
At a glance, however, pad training is often a good way to introduce your dog to the concept of peeing in one place and one place only, as well as keeping themselves clean, giving them a safe space and developing the behaviour you want to see from them.
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Many professionals agree that puppy pads can be a very good thing for your dog as they help them to distinguish between their own space, such as their sleeping or eating area, and where they need to go to do their business. This helps to reinforce the idea of what a home is for your dog, which also allows them to be socialised properly.
The Puppy Toilet Training Process
With the preliminary preparations out of the way, it’s time to learn all about the toilet training process itself. From identifying the signs that your pup needs to go to the toilet, to the best tried and tested techniques that’ll help them to understand exactly what is being asked of them – these are some of the best puppy toilet training tips to follow.
How to Tell if a Dog Needs the Toilet
Learning to identify when your pup needs to go to the toilet is one of the most important steps when it comes to toilet training. The faster you act when your puppy shows signs of needing a potty break, the more likely you are to establish a reliable routine early on. After all, dogs like to go in the same spot, so making sure that a ‘special place’ isn’t in your house is the best way to avoid any unwanted accidents.
Whilst all puppies are different, they tend to display the same behaviours when they need to go, including:
Sniffing the floor
Circling
Seeming restless
Whining and barking
Squatting
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When you notice these behaviours, it’s time to get their lead and head outside. Remember, even if your puppy gets distracted with all the excitement of the garden, you know that they need to go, so be sure to persevere until they do.
The Best Puppy Toilet Training Tips
Some puppy training techniques certainly stand out as bringing better results than others. Some of the best techniques that provide fast, reliable results include:
Positive reinforcement - reward your puppy for going in the right place, rather than punishing them when they go in the wrong place. This gentle approach encourages positive relationships and is a great foundation for future training.
Crate training - focus on creating a safe, no-soil space so that you have more control over setting a routine of going outside to go to the toilet - especially at night time.
Paper training - place a puppy pad in the desired spot, preferably close to the back door, and teach your dog that this is their potty spot before you progress to going outside. Do be mindful, however, that you’ll want to use this pet training pad method sparsely to avoid confusion and, ultimately, negative habits that are a whole lot harder to break.
Establish a Routine
Routine is key to reliable toilet training in so many ways. After all, toilet training is all about building habits, so you need to be consistent to make that happen.
Although it’s great to be able to identify the signs that your pup needs to go, this may result in a few near misses. Instead, you should establish a routine and take your dog outside every few hours to start with, ensuring to positively reinforce successes until your dog begins to actively ask to go out.
Always Take Them to the Same Spot
Dogs are pretty clean with their natural toilet habits, which is why paper and crate training work so well, as they tend to like to go in the same place.
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When training your puppy, you should always take them to the same place. Not only will this help to establish a routine, but it will also help them learn what they’re supposed to do when you take them to that spot. This makes it far more likely that they’ll take themselves to the back door and go to the toilet in that familiar place in the future.
Don’t Leave Your Puppy Alone
As tempting as it may be to open the back door and let your dog out to please themselves (especially when it’s freezing cold or pouring with rain) this can really hinder the training process.
Puppies are naturally inquisitive, so if you’ve not got a close eye on them, there’s a real risk that they’ll get distracted exploring and get called in before they’ve been to the toilet. Additionally, it will also make it much harder to know whether they’re using their toilet spot and if positive reinforcement is in order.
Keep an Eye on Your Puppy Indoors
As well as accompanying your puppy outside, you should also be sure to supervise them when they’re in the house, as you’ll be able to act fast if you spot any of the signs that your dog needs to go.
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However, it is simply impossible to watch your puppy at all times, so if you do ever have to leave them unattended, then it’s always worth putting down some puppy pads to prevent any accidents.
Reduce Toilet Trips Gradually
Generally, puppies can hold their bladders for around one hour for every month of their age, so a three-month-old pup should be able to go three hours between toilet trips.
Although you may want these trips to be slightly more frequent in the early stages of training – you don’t want to make your dog wait until the very last minute, after all - you’ll want to start cutting these down as soon as you see positive behaviours forming.
Although you may be reluctant to do this, if you continue to take your pup out too often, then you’ll never teach them to hold their bladder or ask to go out themselves.
What to do if Your Dog Has an Accident in the House
Even if you do everything right, potty training isn’t linear and accidents are inevitable. This isn’t great news (at least not for your upholstery!), but it needn’t be a disaster if you know how to handle the situation.
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If your dog has an accident in the house, the first thing to note is that you should never get angry with them. Your puppy is still learning, so a patient approach is the only way to build a positive, trusting relationship. Still, you need to act fast to prevent it from becoming a habit.
Your approach here will largely depend on what stage of the process you discover the crime, so let’s consider each situation in turn:
You Find an Old Accident
If an accident happened without you noticing at the time, then the best thing you can do is clean it up fast (preferably when your dog isn’t watching), without making a fuss about it. At this stage, your puppy won’t associate anything you do with the accident they had, so you’ll have to cut your losses and simply make sure that you clean the area to avoid a repeat performance in the same spot.
You Find Your Puppy About to go Indoors
If you walk into the room and see your puppy in the act of sniffing or even starting to squat, quick thinking and distractions tend to be the best approach!
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Although you might be panicking, it’s important not to shout in this situation, as this could lead to fears surrounding the toilet – or your dog may even go anyway due to anxiety. Instead, speak excitedly, or offer a treat that quickly stops them in action and buys you time to take your puppy outside. Accident averted – phew!
You Catch Your Dog Going Indoors
If you’re a few seconds too late and your puppy has already started to go when you walk in, then you need to act fast. Although there’s no use jumping in and trying to distract them at this stage, it is worth pointing out what they’ve done and letting them watch you clean up so that they know not to do the same again.
What to do if Your Dog Keeps Having Accidents
In some rare cases, a puppy that’s doing well with toilet training may continue to have accidents in the house when placed in certain situations. While some accidents are inevitable, if it becomes a regular occurrence, then it’s something you may want to address.
In many cases, behaviour like this is less to do with toilet training than it is to do with issues like stress or separation anxiety. If this is the case, house training principles are unlikely to help as it fails to get to the root of the problem, so further action may be necessary to see your home accident-free.
If you think your pup may have separation anxiety or is showing signs of stress, then it’s important to establish what’s causing it and take the necessary steps to ease their worries.
The Most Common Mistakes with Puppy Toilet Training
With the best intentions and all the knowledge in the world, puppy training is an intense full-time job that even the best of us don’t get right all the time.
Unfortunately, when it comes to finding fast puppy training solutions, any mistakes can put a real spanner in the works and slow the process down. There are some common mistakes that nearly all new owners make when training their new puppy, but if you’re aware of them it can help you from making the same mistake twice!
Inconsistency
As we’ve said before, a routine is fundamental as you try to build positive toilet habits and is the only real way to teach your puppy when it comes to the toilet. Unfortunately, many owners apply certain techniques intermittently, causing more confusion than necessary.
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The main thing to remember is that you should never implement a specific method if you don’t intend to see it all the way through. What’s more, you should always do all your research and shopping in advance so that you can be safe in the knowledge that you’ll stick to the technique throughout the training process.
Becoming Too Laid Back
We all get distracted sometimes, but there’s no room for this where house training is concerned. In an ideal world, you should be around at all times to act fast and prevent any accidents from becoming a habit.
However, many owners become too laid back with toilet training too early on, causing confusion, accidents and even more work when it comes to training!
Relying on Verbal Praise
All praise is good where training is concerned, but for your pup, having you say ‘well done’ isn’t much reward at all. In fact, failing to provide a small treat every time they go can slow training progress down quite a lot.
This doesn’t need to be anything substantial, but keeping a tiny treat with you during outings can make a huge difference to how quickly your puppy picks up on what you want them to do. Over time, you’ll be able to reduce these treats until the outdoor toilet connection has been made.
Being Impatient
Sometimes, the mistake many owners make rests purely in expecting too much too soon. The reality is, however, that even a fast toilet training process will take a minimum of four months. Additionally, it’s important to remember that you’re training an animal – a baby one for that matter – so things may not always go as smoothly as you envisaged.
By assuming that you’re done and taking your eye off the ball before your puppy is good and ready, you make it far less likely that the habit will stick, and far more likely that you’ll have to retrain in future.